Insecurity: Let Tinubu, Defence Minister travel without escorts — APM

The Allied Peoples Movement, APM, has challenged President Bola Tinubu and Defence Minister, Gen. Christopher Musa (retd.), to travel by road without armed security escorts if they insist that Nigeria’s security situation has improved.

According to the party, the security crisis is not something to be measured only in official briefings or statistics. It is the fear of travelling by road, the empty seat at home after an abduction, or the family waiting for news from someone who never returned.

Against that backdrop, the APM said the government’s assessment does not reflect the reality on the ground.

In a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Abubakar Yusuf, the party accused the Tinubu administration of living in denial over worsening insecurity and faulted Musa for claiming that the country’s security situation had improved.

The APM said the claim was contradicted by the 2026 Global Terrorism Index, GTI, which it said ranked Nigeria as the fourth most insecure country in the world, up from sixth place in the 2025 index.

Yusuf said: “The comments by the minister further expose the Tinubu administration’s insensitivity to the plight of Nigerians, who bear the pain of the daily killings, maiming, rape, abduction for ransom, and incarceration by bandits in dehumanizing conditions in various parts of the nation.”

The party alleged that more than 600,000 Nigerians had been killed and no fewer than 2.2 million others, including women and children, abducted during the Tinubu presidency.

It pointed to the reported abduction of about 600 people from Dekera, Gidan-Zana and Sabon Gida villages in Niger State the previous week, saying most of those taken were women, children and elderly people who remained in captivity.

The APM also cited figures from SBM Intelligence which, it said, showed that kidnapping for ransom had evolved into a highly monetised industry, with more than N7.78 billion allegedly paid in ransom between July 2025 and June 2026.

On the abductions, the party argued: “More disheartening is that while families sorrow across the country, the Tinubu administration is waving off abduction, an act of terrorism, as ‘family affair.’”

The party also argued that the administration was either disconnected from the realities facing Nigerians or deliberately attempting to manipulate public perception by denying the scale of the crisis.

“Our party is disturbed that the administration is either dangerously disconnected from reality or is deliberately attempting to manipulate public perception by denying the actual situation in the country,” Yusuf said.

The APM argued that the worsening insecurity reflected what it described as the government’s failure to develop and implement an effective strategy for containing the crisis.

It consequently warned that Nigeria could not afford another four years under what it described as an ‘ineffective administration’.

Turning its attention to the 2027 election, the party urged Nigerians not to despair but to support its presidential candidate, Oyo State Governor Seyi Makinde, whom it said had a blueprint for tackling insecurity and other challenges facing the country.

Yusuf said: “The APM, however, urges Nigerians not to despair but to remain steadfast in their resolve to vote for our presidential candidate, the people’s candidate, Engr. Seyi Makinde, who is ready with a blueprint that will address the insecurity and other challenges brought upon our nation by the Tinubu-led administration.”